In the last two installments of our now, thankfully, about-to-end “Less ain’t more” series, I’ve disputed the contention made by some that we should slash the number of races run in this country. To summarize my points:
The market is working. Races are down by more than 30 percent in two decades. However…
The decline [...]
In my last post, I responded to the notion that, in the words of Steve Crist, “We run way too many races in this country,” and to the related suggestion, advanced by Jeremy Plonk at ESPN, that racing adopt a strict, top-down system limiting racing at any point in the year to just eight tracks.
As [...]
There’s an article, by Jeremy Plonk of ESPN (read it, here, if you must) that seems to be in somewhat wide circulation in the racing world. Which I define as, “I’ve seen it linked to on two or three blogs.”
The central thesis of the article can be described thusly: racing’s problem in the United States [...]
The future arrives pretty much on schedule without any help from us. That, of course, can be either a good thing — for example, while waiting for President Bush to become an ex-President — or a bad one. Say, when you’re watching horse racing lurch towards its own future.
Which future arrives for horse racing — [...]
Use your mentality/ Wake up to reality.
So sang Frank Sinatra — in one of the truly awful lyrics of the American songbook — in an otherwise terrific song, “I’ve Got You Under My Skin.”
How horses “use their mentality” is one of the most important — though often unremarked — factors in their success or failure [...]
A bunch of emails arrived in my inbox last night at around the same time with the exact same subject line: Slots!
I haven’t exactly hidden my feelings on the issue of slot machines in Maryland, and last night — after a decade-plus of the legislature’s inability to resolve the issue — the voters of Maryland [...]
